Pandora’s Box Reopened? Debating Germany after 1990

Die Büchse der Pandora? Deutschland nach 1990

It seems to be a never-ending story. Nearly 30 years after reunification, Germany is again debating differences and conflicts between East and West. After years of silence, the rise of right-wing populism in the East is again fuelling politicized, polarized and polemic discussions about East-German “deviations” – and their historical origins. Especially scholars of contemporary history could play a crucial role in facilitating a differentiated debate by developing new perspectives on and shaping new narratives of recent German history, thus overcoming the exhausting and exhausted blame game between East and West.

Who Wants to Open the “Box”?

Looking at the recent debate in German media, someone seems to have tried to open Pandora’s Box. Richard Schröder, former Chairman of the Social Democrats in the first (and last) freely elected GDR parliament seemed to be outraged. Schröder levelled a harsh attack at his fellow party member, the Saxon State Minister for Gender Equality and Integration, Petra Köpping.[1] After a devastating review of her bestselling book Integriert doch erstmal uns!,[2] Schröder even threatened to leave his already deeply shaken party. What had happened? Köpping’s publication demanded a critical reassessment of recent (East) German history. The cultural damage suffered by the economic “shock therapy” after reunification during the early 1990s should, she declared, be a broad topic for public and scientific debate. Especially the role of the highly controversial Treuhandanstalt, a special agency run by Western managers to privatize or liquidate the over 8,500 enterprises of East Germany’s planned economy, should be discussed by a so-called “truth and reconciliation commission.”[3]

A Call to Arms

This claim worked like a call to arms: Conservative, liberal and mostly Western advocates, as well as left-wing and mostly Eastern critics, are once again rushing to arm the trenches criss-crossing the politics of history. While the former hail the economic transformation directed by the Treuhand and its leading managers as tremendous success,[4] the latter deplore a brutal Western capitalist regime, which imposed neoliberal “shock therapy” upon the powerless East Germans.[5]

After the Populist Shock

It seems that the harsh conflicts of the early 1990s are coming back out of the blue: After the striking electoral successes of the right-wing, anti-immigrant “Alternative für Deutschland” (AfD), especially in Eastern Germany, and after violent clashes in Chemnitz in August 2018, debates over long-lasting conflicts between East and West were lashing a surprised nation.[6] Thirty years after reunification, long-demanded “inner unity” now seemed sheer chimera. And a hectic search for the “causes” started again: Were the long-term effects of a collectivist dictatorship and its repressive institutions, which had crippled a country’s democratic capacities, now hitting home? Or were they the consequences of the profound cultural changes and challenges many Easterners had suffered especially in the wake of capitalist “shock therapy”?[7]

Two Arch-Villains

In the end, a typical German blame game about GDR history has once again erupted. Two “arch-villains” are facing off: On the one hand, the communist SED regime, which presided above a completely run-down planned economy before 1990, but never had to face the harsh consequences of four decades of politicized mismanagement[8]; and on the other, the Treuhand, with its post-1990 hit-and-run makeover (i.e. privatization) of a planned into a market economy after 1990, which crippled East German society with deindustrialization, mass unemployment and mass exodus.[9] In the end, there seems little to no room for a balanced discussion that might provide a more complex explanation. Coming to recent (East) German history, light and darkness seem to be the only possible conditions.

A “Bad Bank” of Memory Culture

In the field of memory culture, the Treuhand was identified as one important piece of the East German puzzle. Nearly unknown to Western Germans or younger people today, simply mentioning the name of this long-gone organization can infuriate older East Germans. In a short study for the German Federal Ministry of Economics, my co-author and I described the Treuhandanstalt as a “bad bank” in a strikingly divided German remembrance culture.[10] As a kind of a dystopic myth, in the eyes of many elder East Germans, the Treuhand stands for everything that went wrong after the unexpected downfall of socialism. In the East, the high expectations of revolution in 1989 suddenly turned into profound disillusion after reunification at the end of 1990. From their perspective, the Eastern part of the country was completely taken over by Western elites, institutions and ideas – with nearly no room for additional experiences from the East. For this complete takeover, the Treuhand served as the focal point of a debated “unification crisis.”[11]

“Protective Shield” or “Boomerang”?

In the short run, especially this organization had absorbed much of the collective frustrations after ordering mass redundancies and company closures. In no less than two years, nearly 90 percent of state companies were privatized (mostly to Western firms) or shut down; out of 4 million jobs in 1990 only 1 million survived. In this time, the Treuhand functioned as a “protective shield” for the political and economic system of the reunited Germany.[12] But its cultural long-term impact has been remarkable, and may be likened to a cultural boomerang: During the last couple of years, for many Easterners the Treuhand has transformed into a cultural symbol of submission and liquidation. Nowadays, it marks a striking cultural distance many Easterners are expressing concerning the political and economic institutions.

Overcoming the “End of History”?

This explains the fears of “reopening” Pandora’s box. But how might we move on from this point, especially as historians of contemporary history? Until recently, the year 1990 marked the notorious “end of history” in historical research – with reunification as a national happy ending to a long and dark German “special path” in the “age of extremes.”[13] Even these old historical narratives demonstrate that the disciplinary barrier of 1990 is outdated. If contemporary history claims to be a “history of our present problems,” then we need to end the “end of history.”[14] Discussing the times of transformation after 1990, especially distanced and source-oriented historians could provide overheated public debate with sobre empirical research, differentiated perspectives and, most of all, new narratives beyond the old stereotypes. Ultimately, we might even be able to offer some new leitmotifs, ones able to intertwine the still-divided histories of the GDR and post-GDR, of East and West Germany, but also of Germany and Eastern and Western Europe. Perhaps we might even be able to bring them together into a broader picture. Thus, perhaps the fears of what lies in Pandora’s box are unfounded.[15]

Redaktionelle Verantwortung

Copyright (c) 2018 by De Gruyter Oldenbourg and the author, all rights reserved. This work may be copied and redistributed for non-commercial, educational purposes, if permission is granted by the author and usage right holders. For permission please contact the editor-in-chief (see here). All articles are reliably referenced via a DOI, which includes all comments that are considered an integral part of the publication.

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For someone like me, who was born twenty-five years ago in the beginning of the 90s, a separated East and West Germany is history, a reunited country is all I know. The German reunification is something I have only encountered through stories told by my parents and their friends, through often very emotional videos on Youtube of people climbing the Berlin wall on November 9th 1989 and briefly as a topic in my History classes in school. However, the Treuhandanstalt was an institution I had not heard of until much later during my studies in college. It is of course possible that I might be an exception. Nevertheless, as far as I know, most of my peers, or in oder to apply the current buzzword for this generation “the millennials“, have never heard of the Treuhand. This is mostly due to the fact that many educational plans in Germany do not include the years after 1989/1990 in their catalogue of requirements.[1]

However, the increasing electoral successes of the “Alternative für Deutschland“ in Germany’s east and incidents like the latest escalation of demonstrations in Chemnitz in August 2018 have redirected the publics eye to the complex issue of Germany`s reunification and its consequences. Current politics confront us with a time and a process, many seem to have forgotten. Therefore, Marcus Boeick asks for an essential reevaluation of the reunification of East and West Germany since 1990. A debate, apparently so delicate, that reopening it can be compared with releasing the evils and sicknesses contained in Pandora`s Box.

The central problem seems to be that two irreconcilable points of view dominate the debate. On the one hand, East Germans blame the “shock-therapy“ which had been administered to the East German economy after 1990. Boeick identifies the ruthless efforts for privatisation of the Treuhandanstalt as the main source of discontent for East Germans, especially of the older generations. Therefore, nowadays the Treuhand is often associated with heteronomy and submission. On the other hand, West Germans, especially the younger ones, often have not even heard of the Treuhand and are also in other respects ignorant to the problems of the former GDR. Others, would claim that it was not the “hit-and-run makeover“ administered by the Treuhand which lead to current inequality, but that we are facing a necessary long-term consequence of four decades of the SED dictatorship.

Hence, Boeick rightly asks for a more balanced and informed discussion. Admittedly, thirty years have passed since the fall of the Berlin wall, only one decade less than the GDR existed. However, the misunderstandings between East and West have not disappeared. The reasons are more complex and any Historian knows they go beyond the years 1949 and 1990. Current issues are numerous. For instance, unemployment and brain drain are much more severe in Germany’s east than in the west. Furthermore, states like Mecklenburg-Vorpommern or Brandenburg have to battle an increasing depopulation and overageing especially in the rural areas, whereas Baden-Württemberg or the city states are facing more and more intense housing problems and rising rents due to over population.

Therefore, regardless of current or passed differences, wether concerning historical reasons or nowadays problems, it seems crucial to revisit and reinitiate the reunification debate. Democracy is nothing but communication and often dispute.

Accordingly, we have to acknowledge that different regions have different problems and therefore different points of view. Moreover, it seems crucial that we talk to each other and that we do not create an artificial “us“ and “they“. This is even more important with regard to the younger generations, who need to be informed and educated. In order to enable our young generations to understand the present, we need to talk about the past i.e. the reunification, including the Treuhand. This is only one of the few reasons why student exchange programmes between east and west are still reasonable.2 Through this type of exchange programme students can engage with history and its consequences in real life and experience that every statement can be assessed from a different perspective. Therefore, the reunification and the years after 1989/90 are a great example of how the demand for multi-perspectivity in History classes can not only be conveyed through the analysis of texts or images but through the interaction with contemporary witnesses and local history.[3]

Thus, understanding that Germany’s history did not end in 1990, entails adapting educational plans. It also means, initiating a public conversation about the past which might facilitated a conversation about the future. The present issue is a brilliant example of how historiography can take away the fears of opening Pandora’s Box. Facing Pandora’s evils might even facilitate the healing of the collective psyche. Thus, historians as well as teachers of History should raise their voice more often in order to help the general public understand its present and help shape its future.